It could be the time of year, which for my team is unfortunately the busiest, or it may have been the sourness this week of the Oxford Poetry scandal, but I was completely caught unawares when the world media announced that Alice Munro had won the 2009 Man Booker International. The reaction of the [...]
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Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise (That last infirmity of noble mind) To scorn delights, and live laborious days. – John Milton, Lycidas I guess it [...] In October of 2003, Canada had the inconvenient fun of having to compare two competing indulgences. On the one hand, there was the right of Parliamentary committees to summon and investigate all Federal organizations, whether they reported to Parliament directly or not. And on the other, the right of the then Privacy [...] About three years ago I had a bad moment in one of Canada’s largest book chains. I was trying to find a Graham Greene novel, and the price of the only copy available was almost two and a half times that of the listed US sales price. Even more expensive after the probable conversion [...] Many years ago when I was an undergraduate, in a townie bar that was so small and spare it could have fitted easily into any airport lounge, I had an argument that I could not win. The friend I was chatting with enjoyed tugging on my academic roots, and although his father was a GP [...] Auspicious news — BBC Radio 4 is producing all of John LeCarre’s Smiley books. For those unaware, John LeCarre’s early books centred on the retiring British spy George Smiley and are essentially responsible for bringing realism into what was otherwise a rigid genre (the Mary-Sue Superspy). Influenced by Graham Greene and a [...] “And I especially puzzled and wondered when I remembered how long a time had passed since my nineteenth year, in which I had first fallen in love with wisdom and had determined as soon as I could find her to abandon the empty hopes and mad delusions of vain desires. Behold, I was now getting [...] I had the chance this past weekend to listen in to Simon Mayo’s show, featuring Stephen Fry for that one day. What a wonderful discovery. I’ve always liked the actor/writer, and I was taken by a few things he said. Enough to transcribe some of them here (all rights to Mr.Fry and/or BBC radio 5): The idea of a vocation is now defunct in an age of specialization and broad material risk. When this decline started, I’m not sure, but probably we can trace it merrily to the end of popular religion in Western, industrial countries. Although, curiously, having a vocation is not an event you see many people in [...] Your specific role and responsibility is to “raise the bar.” It’s not sufficient to meet the goals with quality or to create sustainable results, to not leave bodies in the road and completely alienate your peers. You are judged on exceeding all expectations all the time. This is a performance culture. It’s [...] |
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